


A Star Shattered

by Flutiebear



Category: Dragon Quest Series, Dragon Quest XI
Genre: Angst, Heavy Angst, M/M, Spoilers, Spoilers for Act 2, saaaaaaadness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-07-29 20:17:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 800
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16271579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flutiebear/pseuds/Flutiebear
Summary: Some collected drabbles on the first couple hours of the Act 2, right after the BIG HUGE SPOILER THAT KEEPS ON SPOILERING. So, like, if you haven't gotten past Yggdrasil, keep on moseyin'. Thar be spoilers ahead.





	A Star Shattered

**Author's Note:**

> Just a few drabbles from The Luminary's point of view through Fall of Yggdrasil up to around when you set out for Heliodor. No real plot or anything, just an outlet for some angst. Delicious, delicious angst. Mmm.

You blaze across the sky, a star shattered, a promise broken. Your body burns bright as you plummet down, down, from Yggdrasil's dying branches. Your skin scalds, your hair ignites. Everything melts away until all that is left of you is light fantastic.

In all your many travels, you never realized that being the Luminary meant that one day you'd literally catch on fire.

You fall for an age, roiling faster and brighter and hotter, until you become the beacon that draws every eye in Erdrea.

In the months and years hence, the people will speak of you—not knowing it is you, of course—only knowing that in the moments before Yggdrasil fell, a shooting star screamed across the sky; a brief, hot scar on the heavens that heralded the world's ruination. Erdwin's Lantern, reborn.

Turns out, you really _were_ the Darkspawn.

***

You have a scar now. A big black bloom that stretches the length of your shoulders, right where Jasper's spell struck you. A new Mark, for a new Age.

It doesn't heal, and it doesn't fade. Sometimes it even appears to writhe and change shape. In the darkness, it grows bigger. It— _breathes._

You don't know how it reacts to light. There isn't enough of it left in Erdrea to find out.

You've seen a similar mark only once before, in the shape of a swirling black fist, gripped over Erik's heart. He took pains to keep it hidden, of course. After Gondolia, he began bathing on his own, and he never once swam in the ocean or laundered his clothing with the rest of you. But you spotted it once, briefly. He had bent over you after a battle, concern in his eyes, one hand outstretched to help pull you to your feet. The wind had caught his tunic and revealed his secret.

It had frightened you that tangible reminder of how close you'd come to losing him. All the anger and helplessness you'd felt watching Erik take a curse meant for you—it all came crashing back in an instant: Those lean hours of the evening, creeping between clanking guards and crates that stunk of fish; the sick pit in your stomach; your jittery hands, your racing heart. How with each step closer to Erik you'd begged the Goddess, who'd already taken so much from you, to please let you keep just this one thing, damn her, just this one thing, _please._

But in the end, you lost him anyway.

You ache for him. You ache for them all, a desperation you never knew you could feel. It claws at you, like the black dragon of Heliodor, bellowing after you, thrashing, struggling to break free.

Some days that struggle is the only thing that keeps you alive.

***

Everything is wrong now.

The skies are the color of bruises; the earth burns in great patches, like the dying embers of a campfire. The trees are now great skeleton fingers clawing at the sky. The dead walk once more.

Including Gemma and your mother. Even Sandy. They're all alive.

_Alive_.

Goddess, you used to think that was all you wanted—that you would have given anything just to see your friends, your family one more time. Now, as you survey this ruined world, you wonder if they'd been better off dying after all.

And now you must join forces with Hendrik, of all people; he who has tried to kill you on so many occasions you've lost count.  The merciless knight; the walking scowl.

Everybody calls him a Hero: Gemma, Dunstan, even your mother.

But you know the truth.

You saw the real Hendrik on the cliffs of Dundrasil. And you still see him like that sometimes in your dreams: backlit by lightning, his arm raised for the killing strike. You barely wake from those dreams before the sword falls.

And you're supposed to _trust_ him now?

Nothing makes sense anymore.

Your only consolation is that Hendrik saw the real you at Dundrasil as well: Fierce, unyielding, too damn stubborn to ever give up.  

Surrounded by friends—by loved ones—who gave you strength.

You don't know who you are anymore without them.

In this broken world, there is so little left to cling to. No ideals, no institutions. No dreams of a better tomorrow. There is nothing left but people, straining toward each other and against the ceaseless tide of shadows that bears them back.

If the shadows don't kill you, the longing surely will.

But you will find them. You _have_ to. And if you don't, then you will struggle and persist until the effort breaks you, because it's the only way to make sense of the hollows carved into your heart, those six scars that can never be healed, only filled, maybe, once more.

   


End file.
